


ineffable (your boldness stands alone among the wreck)

by snsk



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: AU, Angel!Stiles, Angels, Angst, Demons, M/M, author has issues, demon!Derek, justawolf!scott
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-08-30
Updated: 2012-08-30
Packaged: 2017-11-13 04:38:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,885
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/499562
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/snsk/pseuds/snsk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Derek can feel the angel’s hackles rise; the electricity that comes before lightning. He’s staring at Derek with openly mistrustful eyes, glowing brown and bright, and Derek can hear the almost-imperceptible sound of wings rustling in readiness of an attack. Scott, however, seems to be oblivious. He looks with curiosity at Derek, wary but not closed-off curiosity, ignoring the waves of <em>get back here</em> the angel is emanating.</p><p>Or, that demon/angel AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	ineffable (your boldness stands alone among the wreck)

**α**

 

Derek can feel the angel’s hackles rise; the electricity that comes before lightning. He’s staring at Derek with openly mistrustful eyes, glowing brown and bright, and Derek can hear the almost-imperceptible sound of wings rustling in readiness of an attack. Scott, however, seems to be oblivious. He looks with curiosity at Derek, wary but not closed-off curiosity, ignoring the waves of _get back here_ the angel is emanating.

“Hello,” Derek says.

“Hi,” Scott says. “You’re new, I think.”

He’s not _afraid,_ Derek realises, because he knows his own power, even if he doesn’t trust it yet. He knows that to protect himself, and his best friend, his body will transform into what is needed, even if he hasn’t quite learned to control it.

Dangerous. So reckless. If his best friend were actually mortal, he’d have been ripped into shreds by now, by this adolescent freshly-turned werewolf with no training- and therefore, no self-control- whatsoever. But then that’s what Derek is here for. Well, mostly.

“I can help you,” he tells Scott.

“Uh, what-” Scott asks, “with?”

“I know what you are,” Derek says.

He’s expecting the change in atmosphere this brings, but he wasn’t expecting the way Scott’s teeth sharpen almost immediately into fangs, how the claws shoot out, lightning-quick. How has this kid survived a _week_?

“Who are you?” Scott asks, fangs bared. The angel steps forward, places a hand on Scott’s arm. His eyes never leave Derek’s face.

“I’m one of you,” Derek lies. His teeth elongate, pointed edges almost drawing blood when he runs his tongue over one, and he feels fur pushing itself out around the edges of his face. There’s a dull tingling sensation in the ends of his fingers: his claws, supposedly. It’s hard to speak through a mouthful of sharp canines, but he manages, “I can help you.”

Scott’s been staring at him as he changes. He says: “How.”

“You don’t know how to control it,” Derek tells him, relieved as he starts changing back into mortal form- the fur itched, for Hell’s sake. “Full moon, you nearly killed someone. I could hear the howling _miles_ away. You’re going to get your head on a pike, all of us exposed. You don’t know how to manage this, you’re scared you’ll hurt him-“ he jerks his head at the angel- as if Scott could do the bloody divine being any harm- “-the girl, your mother. I can help you with that. I was born like this, it doesn’t have to rule your life.”

Scott is staring at him, thinking. The angel, however, speaks for the first time, low and hurried, in Scott’s ear.

“Scott,” he says. “You don’t know the guy, come on, how d’you even- I mean, he’s obviously been stalking you, how else would he know about Allison and your mom? Stalking doesn’t make for very good faith, Scott, I don’t _trust_ him-“

“He can teach me not to hurt you, any of you,” Scott tells him, and there, that’s the deal sealed: Derek tries not to grin, demon-wolf-like, at the angel, who’s thrown up his hands in exasperation, recognising defeat. “Look, I can’t even control these claws, I need someone to-“

“Scott-“

“Shh, Stiles,” Scott says. He looks at Derek, sure and certain. “Teach me.”

“Alright,” Derek says, and he turns away, back into the forest, away from the werewolf and the angel whose wings are on the cusp of unfurling, whose eyes are glowing divine-bright in irritation. “Soon.”

**α**

The Hale house is empty, and charred-black, a shell of the home it used to be. Derek stretches his wings out, tired, figuring he’ll sleep on the floor, on them, because the rest of the house is rickety-sharp unfriendly edges and he doesn’t want aching limbs in the morning. They glow, an unearthly, oddly bright inky black against the darkness of the night-

-and retract. There’s someone coming, someone at the door. Someone _knocking_ , as if manners are important even when you come to the abandoned remains of a burnt-down house at 2 a.m.

“Who the fu-“ Derek mutters, and doesn’t throw something on as he goes to answer the door. If his wings need to come out for a fight, he’d prefer not to rip a nice shirt.

He can feel the unearthly presence on the other side, the divine light of all that is good and holy practically shining through the cracks in the door. Oh.

Derek throws open the door.

“To what do I owe this pleasure?” he snarls, and is promptly distracted a flash of white, and the angel pulling on a plaid shirt. He’d flown here. That had been his wings, warm and white and feather-down soft, retracting.

The angel- seems to be distracted, as well. By Derek’s chest. Except that can’t be right. He shakes his head, and looks up. “Um.”

 _"What is it_ , angel,” Derek growls, recovering himself.

This seems to piss the angel off. “Aren’t you going to invite me in?”

Derek _looks_ at him. And doesn’t budge.

“Well, that’s polite,” the angel snaps. “We’ll just talk out here, then, in the freezing December night air, and you aren’t even covered up properly, with the chest, and the skin, and everything- why aren’t you covered up properly, you’re going to catch cold, for God’s sake, not that I care, but it’ll throw a spanner into the works of your evil plan, which is- yes. That’s it. Your evil plan. You’re not a werewolf.”

“You’re not a human, either,” Derek informs him.

“Oh, well done,” the angel remarks, “good job, fifty points to Slytherin, what great feat of observation will you attempt next, Sherlock? Could it be that the world is round, or Hell is hot? Of course I’m not mortal, but I, unlike you, have a job to do here, an actual purpose, whereas you, you, what in heaven and earth- and hell, I s’pose, what reason have you got for lying to the kid?”

“The _kanima_ ,” Derek snaps, more to get him to shut up than anything else. “It’s not ours, it’s out of control. I’ll deal with it. I need Scott for that.”

This throws the angel off. “I thought it was one of yours,” he says.

“No,” Derek says. “Something mutated, along the way. We didn’t expect it. It’s killing people who’ve still got time left, it’s throwing off the balance of things. It’s, it’s not like us, it’s like-“

“-an abomination,” the angel says, quietly, brown eyes fixed on Derek.

“Yes,” Derek says. The night air is quiet, and he doesn’t feel the cold.

“Well,” the angel says, after a pause. “I still don’t trust you.”

“I think it would break some ancient unwritten rule if _you_ trusted _me_ ,” Derek says.

The angel lets out a half-huff. “And the kanima,” he adds. “I don’t think it knows what it is. Who it is. It might be anyone, might be a kid. You’ll have to find some other way to stop it without killing it.”

“We’ll see, angel,” Derek says crossly.

“I won’t let you,” the angel tells him, calmly. “And it’s Stiles.”

“What.”

“You can’t call me angel all the time. Derek. That’s nice. Good choice. Short, angry. Werewolf-y.”

“Shut up,” Derek informs him. “I’m closing the door.”

“You aren’t even going to walk me home,” the angel- Stiles, fine- says. “I thought you were a gentleman.”

Derek shuts the door.

He doesn’t listen to hear the unfurling of strong, supple, snow-white wings on the other side, the beating of them against the night air. And his mind absolutely does not dream up the image of muscles working in the sky, of pale skin and undefined, ageless strength.

That way. That way madness lies.

**α**

Scott is proving difficult to teach. Mostly because he doesn’t listen.

“Get _rid of the girl_ ,” Derek snarls for the umpteenth time, as Scott runs up to him. “You’re only going to hurt her until you can control it.”

Scott looks triumphant. And very, very late. Because he’d been necking with the girl for the past hour. Derek feels like he’s going to explode. Or wolf out. And he’s not even a wolf.

“Derek, listen,” Scott says, panting. “Listen, guess what Stiles and I found out today!”

“Reasons why I shouldn’t rip your head off for being thirty minutes late?” Derek suggests.

“She’s my anchor,” Scott says, beaming all over. “Allison. Because I’m in love with her. And it keeps me from wolfing out, ‘cause when I think of her my heart rate goes back down, we tested it today. So I don’t have to keep away from her, she’s helping me control it. She’s my anchor. That’s what Stiles calls it.”

“Huh,” Derek says. “Your anchor. Is a girl who comes from a family of wolf hunters.”

“I’m in love with her,” Scott informs Derek again, grinning happily.

“Oh, Hell,” Derek says.

“I still think he should keep away from her,” Stiles says, later, to Derek, who’s perched outside his window, on the roof. “It’s only going to end badly. Probably in tears and heartbreak and a lot of blood and broken-off arrows. But it’s true, she does calm him down, and he needs to control this, first, before we can stop the kanima. I had to _chain him up_ last full moon.”

“It’s dangerous,” Derek says.

Stiles mock-gasps. “You do care.”

“Need him for kanima,” Derek growls. “Do. Not. Care.”

“Alright, chill, Mr Big Bad My-Heart-Is-Full-Of-Nothing-But-Hatred Demon, you’re talking with fullstops again,” Stiles says. “Heh, wait, thought I heard something.” He ducks his head inside for a bit. “Nope, still sleeping.”

Derek says, curiously, “That man-“

“He’s a mortal,” Stiles says. “One of the few with the Knowledge. Um, he’s supposed to keep an eye on me.”

“Why?”

“Well, I’m a teenager, at least on Earth,” says Stiles. “And I might be an angel, but we. We make mistakes.”

“Really?” Derek asks disbelievingly.

Stiles looks at him, then away. “Yes,” he says, quiet.

“Oh,” Derek says.

“Yep. Um, for example, technically I’m working together with a demon. They might not like that.”

“They just mightn’t,” Derek agrees. He unfurls his wings, Stiles’ eyes on the inky-black movement of the feathers, and takes off.

**α**

Derek slashes Peter Hale’s neck, more for show than anything else, because Peter, as well as being a psychopath murdering Alpha, is a demon, as well, who can very well find another form, and growls out, “I’m the Alpha now.”

He can feel Stiles rolling his eyes behind him, and represses the urge to say, “I saw that.”

Scott looks dismayed. But Stiles is pleased, because he hadn’t wanted Scott to murder someone in cold blood, however killer-evil that someone was.

“It’s his soul,” he’d explained to Derek, the night before. “It’ll be tainted. Even though it won’t really be a death.”

“How about my soul?” Derek asks.

Stiles stares, and says: “Um, haven’t you done- didn’t you want to- oh, you’re joking, ha-ha-ha, that’s hilarious, somebody found a sense of humour.”

So it works out for both of them: Stiles gets to preserve Scott’s pure innocent soul, and Derek gets to be the Alpha, which, hey, is cool enough in itself, and recruit some back-up without it being too suspicious.

He fights the urge to turn and grin at Stiles.


End file.
